Barney Frank's Recess Promises to Be 100% Pure Adrenaline

Congressman Dana Rohrabacher, a life-long piece of work, is going to spend the August congressional recess surfing with Barney Frank. We're guessing it'll be weird?

Rohrabacher is apparently a member of the "Congressional Surfing Caucus," with Brian Bilbray and Duncan Hunter. (Oh, god, Duncan Hunter's son is also named Duncan Hunter? Why didn't anyone tell us that he had his dad's seat now?) We're guessing other California congresspeople surf too, but they just don't want to hang out with those assholes, two of whom are only congressmen because of the breathtaking corruption of their predecessors (well, one of them is a congressman because of the breathtaking corruption of his dad).

Anyway! Apparently Barney Frank's boyfriend Jim Ready is a surfer, and mentioned this to Rohrabacher, and Rohrabacher then invited Barney to go surfing with him this month some time. And Barney probably just had to say yes because his boyfriend wanted a vacation or something, right?

"We have them set up at surfers hotel," says Rohrabacher, joking that Frank "will probably have to lie on the beach like a whale while the rest of us are in the water."

Ha, ha. Barney Frank is fat, and Rohrabacher does not support his right to marry his long-time romantic partner. It's funny.

Here are some fun facts about Rohrabacher:

He used to be a crazy libertarian. Like a radical one, in the '70s. He was charged with touring college campuses trying to attract recruits to the cause by playing songs he wrote about individualism.

He is Jack Abramoff's best friend. He was the only congressman to write a letter on Abramoff's behalf urging leniency in sentencing, and he continued eating at Abramoff's restaurant long after everyone else knew enough to stop.

Rohrabacher went to Afghanistan in 1988 to fight the Soviets with the Mujahadeen. He supported the Taliban for a time, and he and Grover Norquist met with the Taliban's foreign minister during a trip to Qatar. This happened in the summer of 2001. (To be fair, he was critical of the Taliban for harboring Osama bin Laden, though only because that was a way to score political points again Bill Clinton.)

But the number one reason Frank should totally be wary of Rohrabacher's invitation is revealed in this seemingly innocuous story of how he met his wife in 1988:

"Some 18-year-old girl asked me if I was a surfer or not, and I said, ‘Sure,'" Rohrabacher recalls. "So a couple days later, she said, ‘I am really glad you are a surfer - I enrolled you in a surfer contest.' She was one of the local Republican activists. I said, ‘Oh my gosh, I haven't surfed since I was in high school.'"

As the story goes, the girl invited Rohrabacher to join her and her boyfriend on the beach the following day. He obliged and has been hooked on the sport ever since.

Oh, and about the girl? He eventually would marry her. In 2004, the couple had triplets.

"The boyfriend had to be left on the beach, so to speak," Rohrabacher says.